In an effort to promote staff transparency and try and regain some of the lost trust amongst members, I will now be taking questions about literally anything involving the site and our recent disciplinary actions. I cannot go into specifics, or discuss specific persons' bans, due to wanting to continue to respect the privacy of those involved on both sides of the issue and not wanting to seem like we're trying to drag anyone through the mud because that's the opposite of what we want. Other staff may chime in, but I guarantee that if you ask a question, it will be answered in some way/shape/form with no repercussions whatsoever.

This is for both current and for any potential future actions that are taken.

I'm a newish member so I have no idea what's been going on, I've only heard a few things from other members. Can one of the staff kind of explain the situation without specifics I mean? I saw other people had no idea what was happening either

I'm a newish member so I have no idea what's been going on, I've only heard a few things from other members. Can one of the staff kind of explain the situation without specifics I mean? I saw other people had no idea what was happening either

Basically, we were forced to ban a small group of members because of repeated instances of nasty behaviours including picking on people and singling them out. Because Meadow (our site manager) no longer wanted to pay to maintain a site that fosters bullying, we were given no other option, or else the site would have been taken down. It's fairly understandable when you look at how bad things got. Constant arguments and complaints from members about feeling victimized by other members. Who would want to pay to support a community like that? We only did what we could. We tried everything else and we've put up with being called out and attacked for months now. Even the staff deserve basic respect, just like any other user of the site.

I understand why a lot of people are dissatisfied with the decision. Their friends may have been banned, or they may not fully understand what's going on. The truth is that FT is in a hard spot at the moment and the last thing it needs is negativity. That's why we've had to ban some members that were pretty much just sticking around to troll or act passive-aggressively and see what they can get away with. Positive change doesn't start happening in the community until we want it to and start acting accordingly. That goes for staff and everybody else alike.

The general history is that we had a few situations arise all at about the same time. These situations called for us to do something we dislike doing; getting involved with off-site affairs. One of which was due to legality issues that could be traced back to the site with even less evidence than actually existed. This resulted in disciplinary actions being taken against some members, it was not taken lightly and it was not taken without serious thought.

The next round is a little trickier to explain without getting into specifics, but long story short it led to actions being taken against a small group of popular members. During this time is when word about the site potentially closing due to toxicity, and a general environment contrary to the site's mission. Since then, we've been trying to work, albeit mostly behind the scenes, to try and further clean up the remaining bouts of toxicity lingering.

I can say one thing about our disciplinary process. Whatever our decision on a person may be, whether it's a ban, temp or permanent, or even just a warning; we take each action very seriously and with a fair amount of discussion amongst the whole of the staff

We absolutely have considered that people are upset about this. But while trying to fix this and ask for examples of why people feel it was handled badly, we are met with silence or more vague posts. When that sort of behavior happens it only frustrates us, because we can then only assume that it's because peoples' friends got banned.

So please, if you have examples of how you feel the situation(s) was handled badly, talk to one of the admins directly about it.

I would also like to add, throughout this whole process, nobody offered any alternatives on how to handle things. This behavior had been going on for several years, and everyone involved were given countless opportunities to fix it.

Please understand, this was a last-ditch effort. Appatently a failing one, seeing by what things are still happening, but a best effort nonetheless. We welcome any alternative suggestions.

It's highly redundant to send evidence as friends of the staff were involved within the incidents that had occurred, this, along with the friend bias that is clearly present in the way the staff handles certain incidents that involved their friends, this leaves any such evidence being brushed off so that the staff wont get their friends into trouble.

Also fix the typo in your title, its unprofessional, just like your staff team.

I disagree. We don't give the staff special treatment. Staff members have received disciplinary actions before. That includes me and even friends long-time friends of mine. If you break the rules, you've broken the rules; a position doesn't make you exempt from that. You would have to cite some examples for me to discuss this any further. Not sure what else to day.

I am currently on mobile, so it'll be a bit before I can personally fix it. However the friend bias that you are referring to is something we continue to hear and continue to be confused by. Staff have gotten in trouble both recently and as far back as when I first joined, 8 years ago, if a person is doing something wrong, we are actually inclined to be harsher on the staff as they should know better.

As for the "why even try" attitude, that's exactly what we want to avoid. What will it hurt by trying to talk to someone about what you see as a problem with a staff member?

Edit: As for the communication, that is what we are trying to do here, and instead you are meeting us with sarcasm and snide comments. So please be as respectful as we are being of you in this.

Why don't you actually get those involved together in a special section of the site that's off limits to the general public to discuss the issues WITH those involved to try to solve issues without banning people because you've ran out of ideas from the get go.

I think this sounds like a good idea. If communication is the issue why not talk to the members involved at least so outside people don't have to be told what is going on. You've already said that banning has failed at working, maybe it's time to reconsider

The way we actually do this currently is there are warnings sent out for offenses on site. With each warning is a message that states that if you have any further questions with the action, you are free to contact a staff member to discuss why that action was taken. On bans however it shows up as a message and an email that the person can contact an admin through in order to further discuss things like that.

Why don't you actually get those involved together in a special section of the site that's off limits to the general public to discuss the issues WITH those involved to try to solve issues without banning people because you've ran out of ideas from the get go.

I think this sounds like a good idea. If communication is the issue why not talk to the members involved at least so outside people don't have to be told what is going on. You've already said that banning has failed at working, maybe it's time to reconsider

I think this was brought up and we discussed making something like that for such purposes? We were looking at implementing something like it soon.

Anyway, I think transparency is a key issue we've had. It was a problem years ago for FT's older admins. I think people tend to think of us as a clique.I'd like to dispel that and ensure that members feel better about approaching us. As far as I'm concerned, nobody should be treat better than anybody else here. The staff just facilitate a role for the site.

We can't join chat groups and stuff and discuss confidential subjects due to the problems that has caused us, but I think it would be good to provide a better means for members to discuss problems they have and even get to know us better on an informal level.

We included our emails in the ban notes, AND I have personally been asked several times for my email by others so the banned members may contact me.

I haven't gotten any emails, though. So if people want to communicate with us, its in their field now. We literally cannot do anything else.

Regarding publicly posting info of bans, as we've stated before, that is a road we'll never be going down. All it does is drag names through the mud and point fingers. Its to protect the members involved.

I haven't gotten any emails, though. So if people want to communicate with us, its in their field now. We literally cannot do anything else.

i took the liberty to ask [banned member removed] about this and he says he never got anything in the ban note. says all he got was a ban message but no additional info on contacting staff. He also said others never received anything for contact in such ban notes.

I dont want to get too involved as I only know a small amount of this. But if those that are banned don't get contact notes then how can they try to resolve the situation with you guys?

I haven't gotten any emails, though. So if people want to communicate with us, its in their field now. We literally cannot do anything else.

I dont want to get too involved as I only know a small amount of this. But if those that are banned don't get contact notes then how can they try to resolve the situation with you guys?

Well, the mass banning was a special case as we already had open lines of communication with 90% of the people involved. So I guess we just didn't think it was necessary to include it, as they did (and still do) already know how to contact us. What you're describing was also a special case, you can ask them exactly what the ban note said as it'll have your answer.

Please understand, everything about this communication-wise has been a mess and is NOT the norm. All the banned members talk to each other, send certain people to talk to us, are friends with several of the staff even, and everything else. So I'm barely believing that communication is an issue here. They definitely know how and where to contact us.

(Sorry, I assumed we included emails since that is indeed the norm. I went back and checked and saw that we didn't. But the point about them knowing how to contact us otherwise still stands.)

I haven't gotten any emails, though. So if people want to communicate with us, its in their field now. We literally cannot do anything else.

I dont want to get too involved as I only know a small amount of this. But if those that are banned don't get contact notes then how can they try to resolve the situation with you guys?

Well, the mass banning was a special case as we already had open lines of communication with 90% of the people involved. So I guess we just didn't think it was necessary to include it, as they did (and still do) already know how to contact us. What you're describing was also a special case, you can ask them exactly what the ban note said as it'll have your answer.

I asked him for the ban note and he sent me this.I censored the name for forum rules and stuff but if you want authenticity I can sent staff the clean one if they want.

observe the lack of contact details, or even a message saying contact admins for support on it. literally could just say "your banned fuck off" and it'd be no different.Take note it also lacks on examples of what caused the ban. It may seem obvious, but it's not always so.

i asked him if he had any staff emails, and he didnt. I also took the liberty to ask some others that were banned and they also received nothing in their ban note.

I haven't gotten any emails, though. So if people want to communicate with us, its in their field now. We literally cannot do anything else.

I dont want to get too involved as I only know a small amount of this. But if those that are banned don't get contact notes then how can they try to resolve the situation with you guys?

Well, the mass banning was a special case as we already had open lines of communication with 90% of the people involved. So I guess we just didn't think it was necessary to include it, as they did (and still do) already know how to contact us. What you're describing was also a special case, you can ask them exactly what the ban note said as it'll have your answer.

I asked him for the ban note and he sent me this.I censored the name for forum rules and stuff but if you want authenticity I can sent staff the clean one if they want.

observe the lack of contact details, or even a message saying contact admins for support on it. literally could just say "your banned fuck off" and it'd be no different.Take note it also lacks on examples of what caused the ban. It may seem obvious, but it's not always so.

i asked him if he had any staff emails, and he didnt. I also took the liberty to ask some others that were banned and they also received nothing in their ban note.

So, why is the ban note so lacking?

What we have on log for his ban note is different (not sure if that's edited or what the deal is??? ETA guess it didn't go through? It should have been there, I'll take the fall for that). There's that, and then a second part saying there's no chance for appeal currently, which is also why there's no info listed.

And then I just re-iterate what i said above. Everyone else you're talking to already has open lines of communication with us. So we never thought to put emails. That is usually the case, though (there were a couple people during the ban that we DID list emails for, for example).

Also, its worth noting that there's a character limit for notes. We literally can't list specific examples. 99% of the time, people know exactly what they've done. When they don't, they contact us, and we explain. I'm not sure if that character limit is something we can lift in the system, but I'll check it out.

First off, I'd like to thank the staff for opening up and allowing questions to be asked (I mean you guys probably would have before, but this is a nice invitation). Second off, thanks for dealing with this mess of a situation so far.

I'd like to ask some questions, if thats alright with you guys? 1. Is the number of ACTIVE staff members currently hindering the staff/site any? I feel as if the lack (IMO) of active staff members has brought down the site in ways. But I just want to know your opinion on it.

2.Are there any steps to encourage new members to stick around more? All I see is people who give a friendly greeting to the newer members and ask a couple of questions, and thats pretty much it. It could be just inviting them into things and making them feel welcome, or is there more to it.

Sorry if the questions are worded weird, or just not understandable (I was never known for my quality of English), and once again, thanks for inviting questions. -RickyMcGee

Logged

Just like a burn will linger, she crept between my fingers, and to my body she has now become a new disease. A fog to cloud vision, more like an apparition. She made a mess and now abandoned me.TwitterYoutubeCrush thing?Deviantart